Lamakaan and Hyd Urban Lab invites you for an evening of film screening "Khayal Darpan - A Mirror of Imagination" by Yousuf Saeed.
Khayal Darpan, divided into four parts, totaling a 100 minutes, starts by exploring Pakistan's melodic past, especially in Lahore where south Asia's most famous musicians of early 20th century performed in large concerts as well as small baithaks (homely gatherings) and takias (shrines). It talks about the legendary Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Raushanara Begum, and Nazakat-Salamat Ali, and their discerning local audience who could not be pleased by any substandard music. The partition of India changed the scenario drastically as hundreds of musician families migrated from India to Pakistan, while many Hindu and Sikh patrons of music migrated the other way around. The film looks at the innovative ways in which the musicians struggled to keep their art alive for the new generations.
Synopsis: While much of the literature on the Partition of India provides disturbing accounts of separation and violence, very little academic research has been done on its impact on the material culture of South Asia, especially the arts, music and other traditional forms. Since the apparent justification for the Partition, the ‘two-nation theory’, recognized Hindus and Muslims as two dissimilar communities unlikely to coexist, it was popularly assumed that the Indian Muslims migrating to Pakistan took with them whatever “belonged” to them, leaving behind the “purer” culture of the Hindus in India. As it seemed like the closing of a chapter on cultural co-existence, new chapters had to be written on both sides of the border to sort out what belonged to whom. North Indian classical music, along with other traditional cultural forms, had to bear the brunt of this tug of war, since it represented one of the most vigorous examples of cultural plurality, besides being practiced abundantly in the regions affected by the Partition.
Yousuf Saeed, an Indian filmmaker from Delhi, visited Pakistan in 2005 on research fellowship to explore the impact of 1947 partition on the cultural traditions, especially the classical music of the region. Spending over 5 month traveling through Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad - interviewing musicians and scholars, attending music concerts, and observing the teaching of music in various institutions, Yousuf not only managed to document some of the surviving practitioners and patrons of art music, but also raised many vital questions about cultural identity, nationalism, legitimacy of music in Islam, Pakistan's popular culture and its affairs with India, and the survival of classical music itself in South Asia. The result is a feature-length documentary film, Khayal Darpan, highlighting some well-known as well as many lesser known but talented musicians of Pakistan, breaking many stereotypes about the country.
About the Filmmaker: Graduating from Jamia Millia’s Mass Communication Research Centre (Delhi), Yousuf Saeed started his career in television with the Times TV (Times of India) in 1990, co-directing the science series Turning Point. Later, Yousuf directed many documentary films for Doordarshan and other institutions, including a series on Ladakh and one on the Sufi poet Amir Khusrau. His short films Basant, The Train to Heaven and others have been shown at prestigious international venues such as the universities of Harvard, Boston, Columbia, Chicago, Texas (in the US) and of Heidelberg (Germany), and Vienna (Austria). His other recent films are Qasba Sanskriti: Amroha, Making of the Taj, and Khusrau Darya Prem Ka, among others. He also wrote the illustrated book Muslim Devotional Art in India (Routledge, 2012). More details about Yousuf Saeed at www.yousufsaeed.com Contact the filmmaker: saeed.yousuf@gmail.com
Entry - Free.